Background
Lionel Nathan de Rothschild was born in London and educated at Harrow School and Trinity College, Cambridge where he graduated Bachelor in 1903 and Master of Arts in 1908.
banker horticulturist politician
Lionel Nathan de Rothschild was born in London and educated at Harrow School and Trinity College, Cambridge where he graduated Bachelor in 1903 and Master of Arts in 1908.
Trinity College.
He was the eldest of the three sons of Leopold de Rothschild (1845–1917) and Marie née Perugia (1862–1937) and a part of the prominent Rothschild banking family of England. On 25 January 1910 he was elected to the House of Commons for the constituency of Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire. They had the following children:
Rosemary Leonora Ruth (1913–2013)
Edmund Leopold (1916–2009)
Naomi Luisa Nina (b 1920)
Leopold David (1927–2012)
At the outbreak of World War I, Lionel"s younger brothers Evelyn and Anthony both joined the British Army.
However, as the eldest son he was needed as the heir to take over the family"s North M Rothschild & Sons banking house.
Much to his frustration, Lionel de Rothschild, a Major in the Royal Buckinghamshire Yeomanry, had no choice but to remain at home where he was employed on recruiting duties, for which he was made Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in the Military Division in 1917. However, Lionel de Rothschild had developed an interest in horticulture at a very young age and is said to have planted his first garden at the age of five.
In 1919, he purchased the Mitford estate at Exbury in Hampshire where he devoted a great deal of time and money to transform it into one of the finest gardens in all of England with more than one million plants. In the 1920s, he built Exbury House around an existing structure in a neo-Georgian style.
He constructed a private railway to transport rocks to build the largest rock garden in the country.
As well, Lionel de Rothschild co-sponsored plant-hunting expeditions to places as isolated as the Himalayas to collect seed for plant growth and experimentation. In all, he developed 1,204 new hybrids of rhododendron and azalea that were recognized and sold around the world. Although he continued to work at the family bank, he is quoted as describing himself as "a banker by hobby — a gardener by profession".
Lionel Nathan de Rothschild died in London, aged sixty, in 1942 and was buried in the Willesden Jewish Cemetery.
29th United Kingdom Parliament. 30th United Kingdom Parliament. 31st United Kingdom Parliament.
32nd United Kingdom Parliament.